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When Andre Villas-Boas was manager, Steffen Freund was a constant fixture on the sideline. Playing the animated character to AVB's (usual) straight man, Freund jumped up and down on the sidelines, yelled, screamed, and was just generally the best. We loved him. Most of us still do.
Freund did not lose his position when Villas-Boas was fired, but the Tottenham Hotspur sideline has been noticeably different since Tim Sherwood took over. While we got this amazing GIF, via an untraceable source on the internets, featuring Les Ferdinand:
We haven't seen much recently out of Les or Steffen. We've just seen Sherwood, by himself, staring off into the darkness.
Spurs have an excellent history of great assistants in recent times. Some have been assistant managers while some have just been coaches that did great things on the sidelines, but all were fantastic in their own unique way.
Gus Poyet was by far the most handsome of the group (though Chris Hughton was certainly close), and as evidenced by his runs at Brighton and Sunderland, brought plenty of tactical knowledge to the table as well. When Juande Ramos went, Poyet went with him, which was probably a very bad thing in hindsight. There simply wasn't anyone nearly as good-looking as Poyet on Harry Redknapp's staff.
While Redknapp's assistant, Kevin Bond, was a bit of a bore, Joe Jordan was anything but. While Bond sat on the bench and looked bored with proceedings, Jordan was always screaming something, probably along the lines of "FACKIN DO HIS BRAINS IN". He fought Gennaro Gattuso on the pitch once. It doesn't get any more badass than that.
And then there was Steffen. Via Hotspur HQ.
Steffen was the best of them all. He came to us after coaching German children, which prepared him for a job of jumping around like a maniac, both because he was working with children previously and because German children are better at football than other European children. He did this almost every time we scored. He made watching football really, really fun.
For whatever reason, Steffen isn't doing this anymore. Les Ferdinand isn't doing it either, nor is Chris Ramsey. They've all faded into the background. They all sit on the bench while Sherwood stands on the touchline, looking ... well, rather dull. I like that he's trying to get the team to play really entertaining football, but from a pure people-watching standpoint, he's not giving us much.
We can't forget about our rich history of sideline antics. It's a part of who we are. It's what makes us better than other clubs.
This needs fixing, Tim. I won't have any of your level-headed nonsense.
